


Abnormal

by cellorocket



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Awkward Romance, F/M, Shenanigans, awkward adults, awkward everything, they're awkward and its painful
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-10
Updated: 2018-02-22
Packaged: 2018-05-25 20:04:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6208267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cellorocket/pseuds/cellorocket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hange descended on him five minutes after he sat down for breakfast, as he contemplated a lukewarm bowl of oats. He felt her approach the way one can sometimes sense oncoming natural disasters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> probably one of the most attractive aspects of levihan for me is that these deeply, profoundly intelligent and professional people turn into ridiculous children the minute you introduce feelings into the equation. word of god says levi doesn't know shit about relationships, and i can't see someone as singular as hange having much experience with them either. thus: long silences broken by clumsy truths. thus: Morons In Love

 

Hange descended on him five minutes after he sat down for breakfast, as he contemplated a lukewarm bowl of oats. He felt her approach the way one can sometimes sense oncoming natural disasters. Her eyes were bright, and her gait energetic; a handful of papers fluttered behind her like leaves caught in the wind. Stoutly resigned, Moblit scurried after them, teetering precariously as he rubbed his reddened eyes with the back of his hand.

“I need your help,” she told him without fanfare. “Moblit’s sick.”

He certainly looked ill, though Levi’s eyes narrowed when Moblit gave a somewhat unconvincing cough. “I’m not your assistant,” he said at last, turning back to his breakfast.

“Of course not,” she said with a grin. “That would be a waste of your particular talents. It’s just for today.”

Normally, he would agree without much need for convincing. Most of the time she was looking for a second pair of hands or a sounding board for her latest stream of speculation, and these were things he could handle well enough, when the mood suited. Sometimes, a comfortable quiet would stretch between them. He would glance at her sidelong and watch as she worked, her thin hands moving, and something would lift in his chest.

But that was before the strawberries.

“Find someone else.”

“There _is_ no one else!”

“Bullshit. Find a recruit or something and let me eat.”

She made an impatient sound. “That would take longer than convincing you.”

“Is that so.”

He expected a return jibe, but instead her brows furrowed low, and she peered closer at him. “The duty roster said you’re free today.” _So it’s not like you have anything better to do._

He realized he couldn’t really argue with that. “Fine, goddammit. Fine. Let me finish eating, at least.”

She exchanged a few quiet words with a visibly relieved Moblit, who trudged back the way they had come before Levi had even taken his next bite. He anticipated more teasing as he ate, but to his surprise she sat across from him and set about organizing her shuffled notes and making addendums in focused silence. She didn’t speak again until they were halfway to her office, when she craned a little closer, an equanimous smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

“I told you it’d take less time,” she said.

Levi scowled at her, but said nothing. That was the worst part: She was just about the only person in the world from whom he could tolerate the words _‘I told you so’_. And even that was a near thing.

~

As it turned out, Hange didn’t have much to do either. He followed her into her office and braced himself for the familiar devastation, but an unprecedented sight greeted him: every inch of her office had been cleaned and cleared away, floors swept and notes organized in neat piles, down to an orderly stack of pencils on her careworn desk. At his alarmed expression, she shot him a somewhat sheepish grin and shrugged: “I couldn’t find anything in here.

“Of course,” she said, pulling a few dusty tomes from the shelf, “I don’t actually remember where everything is anyway, since they’re all in new places. But Moblit figures it’ll be easier once we learn.”

“I’ve been saying that for years,” Levi said, annoyed.

“Have you?”

She was definitely teasing him. “What do you want?” His rude words hung in the air between them, an irritating resonance, and he grudgingly attempted to clarify. “With me.” _Not an improvement._

“I’m trying to make a catalogue,” she explained, gesturing to the expansive wall of books behind her. He wasn’t much for reading or sustained periods indoors, but even he had to admit that her collection was impressive. Somehow she’d amassed half her books before her promotion to Squad Leader, purchased on cadet’s meager allowance, snatched from gutters, or ‘rescued’ from unappreciative owners. “It’s part of organizing this mess.” Said with a self-effacing smile. “I just need to you make a list with the title, author, date of publication, and subject. I’ll shelve them in order later.”

Sufficiently mindless yet engrossing, and best of all it would require no conversation. With a grunt of assent, Levi tipped a few books from the shelf into his waiting arms and set to work.

They spent most of the morning quietly working, but to Levi’s increasing annoyance it was no reprieve. They did not speak to each other, or to themselves; for once Hange abandoned her habit of muttering as she worked, but that didn’t stop her from making an unholy racket anyway. Every few moments a page would rustle beneath her fingers, and the sound of her scratchy handwriting would fill the air.

Lately time spent in Hange’s company left him strangely overstimulated, raw and reeling, desperate for some distance. He’d attributed this reaction to her affect; she was frequently enthusiastic regardless of circumstances, and even the most energetic of their comrades couldn’t keep up with her for long. But even in measured (relative) silence, she infiltrated his focus. He found himself stealing glances as the morning wore on, watching. Studying.

Her hair was clean today. The usual random assortment of pencils and pens was conspicuously absent, and her fingertips were a dullish grey instead of black, which could only have been from scrubbing her hands until no traces of dirt or ink remained. He took a studious sniff; dust and starch, and a hint of something sweet.

Her hair was _clean_. Lustrous as polished mahogany, it caught the light from the window, streaking the unruly mass with auburn. Strangely, he was seized by the sudden impulse to twine it around his fingers, perhaps to better admire the color, or feel its smoothness against his skin.

It him a moment to notice that she’d caught him staring. “You don’t smell like shit today,” he managed. “Finally figured out how to bathe?”

“I’m not a child,” she said reproachfully, scrawling a long entry in her catalogue. “There’s such a thing as a filthy adult, you know.”

“Unfortunately.”

This made her smile, though it seemed somewhat stiff to him. “ I … I needed a break.”

“You willingly took a break from work, without being asked. To bathe.” Said with a skeptical eyebrow, so there could be no question how ridiculous he found the entire prospect.

“How do you know Erwin didn’t ask?”

“Erwin doesn’t care.”

“Mike?”

“Mike would just leave the room.” He scowled. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“It wasn’t a question.”

God, she was fucking insufferable. “Why?”

“Well, you talk about bathing enough, I thought I’d give it a try.”

He didn’t dignify that with an answer; already the snap satisfaction of repartee faded, replaced by concern. “Why did you need a break?”

He’d never known her to choose rest over a question in the time they’d been comrades, and suddenly it seemed to be the portent of illness and decay. He was certain; it must be a wasting disease, one that first descended upon the mind of its victim before hollowing them out, until there was nothing but bones left, nothing but rot and regret. No wonder; how frequently did she wash her hands, anyway? A stab of fear shot through him.

She said nothing for a long while. Her shoulders drooped slightly, bowing under the weight of her mood. “I get tired too, Levi.” And the heaviness in her voice made him think she meant _sad_ , or _hopeless_. _Lost_.

“Right,” he said, feeling stupid. Of course she did. They all did; she wasn’t special. His squad wandered the halls like apparitions these days; he had to call Auruo’s name three times before the man registered his presence, and Gunther was worse. Levi had dismissed it as the result of their latest expedition, for in his experience it would take a few days before a soldier could pull back from the battlefield in their mind, and rejoin the rest of the world.

But the longer he thought about it, the more he clung to his impulse. Hange _wasn’t_ like that. Hange worked when she was tired, when she was sick, when wracked by grief and indecision. She even worked the last time she’d been injured, demanding her notes be brought to the infirmary, to his aggravation. It had gotten to the point where he suspected she found work restful, and idleness exhausting. There was something she wasn’t telling him.

Well, there was something he wasn’t telling her, either. Multiple unsaid somethings crowded the room like a bad smell, until it was all Levi could do not to fixate on them.  

Five years of increasingly precarious acquaintance had passed before Levi could admit this to himself. Hange fascinated him. It wasn’t idle curiosity, or annoyance; his regard extended beyond their interactions, haunted him late at night, while the rest of the world slept. He wondered about her, hoarded details she carelessly discarded like the scavenger he had once been, desperate to defeat his fixation.

Isabel would have laughed. She would have liked it, probably; Hange was kind to her once. And she’d never found a better subject to harangue him over than his enforced, stubborn solitude. Farlan would have probably found it unbelievable. That was about as far as the thought went before the old wall came down, locking his ghosts away.

It was just as well; at that moment Hange gently moved his hands aside, fishing a fresh pencil out of the pile beneath his palms.  “Sorry,” she said, noting his flinch.

He said nothing. It had been a brush of skin, nothing more, no reason to get excited. But his heart surged uncomfortably against his ribs before lurching to the pit of his stomach, and his skin tingled where her fingers had touched. He resumed his methodical catalogue before she could say anything else, scrawling with such a heavy hand that the graphite broke.

He didn’t want to be here. He would rather be anywhere than trapped in this stuffy room with Hange behind him, hopelessly distracted by every motion and sound she made, choking on dust from the books and the smell of her washed hair. He’d attempted to put some distance between them in the last few weeks, ever since the disastrous incident with the strawberries, but there were only so many places to go in headquarters, and Erwin relied on the pair of them anyway. And when it came down to it, he couldn’t tell either of them no. He might have found that funny if he found anything funny.

She sneezed, and he nearly jumped out of his skin. _“Santé,”_ he said reflexively, instead of cursing.

“What?”

He didn’t actually know what, or what it meant. “Auruo says it after Petra sneezes.” _Sometimes, anyway. When he doesn’t think I’m around._

Hange brightened instantly. “Has he taught you any more French?”

“No.” And Levi hadn’t asked, as his over-eager subordinate might take the opportunity to go on at length, and Auruo was someone he could only tolerate in small doses.

“Why not?”

“What?”

“Do you know how rare it is to find someone who speaks one of the old languages? It’s hard to find even books on the subject. I could never find out for sure, but I suspect they were purged – easier to dictate a state language if there aren’t many options, right? -- which means that Auruo and his family probably learned passing it down. I wonder how many generations they’ve done so … or how different it sounds compared to a hundred years ago, or even fifty!”

“Why don’t you ask him.”  He could hear the conversation now; her effusive, eager questions met with increasingly reticent answers. He abruptly regretted bringing it up, for both their sakes.

He expected her delighted retort, so it surprised him when she bent over her catalogue without another word. It was so strange that he studied her features, glimpsing the subtle downturn of her mouth before she angled her head away, drawn features obscured by her hair.

He hadn’t believed it possible, but the afternoon was somehow worse. Before, she’d carried on more or less unaware, but now he could nearly feel hurt radiating from her like heat, and it baffled him. He’d seen her fight with a dislocated shoulder, determinedly giving orders without so much as a wince. She hadn’t made a sound when the field medic wrenched it back in its socket, though the pop turned his stomach.

But he could tolerate an uncomfortable silence far longer than anyone else he knew. His preferred state was silence; uncomfortable or otherwise. He’d live the closest thing to a carefree life if more of his comrades shut the hell up. He told himself that until sundown, when the tension in the room had grown so unwieldy that he could no longer breathe without actually savoring the smell of her hair. Little help that he was close enough to feel a shift in the air every time she turned her head.

He had two options: leave, or suffocate. Suffering quietly was no longer an option. Knees popping, he set aside his unfinished catalogue and struggled to his feet. He hoped to escape without being waylaid by another request, as he might have done when she was engrossed in something, but she looked up instantly, eyes wide. “Are you leaving already?”

“It’s sundown,” he said stiffly, gesturing to the window. His hands prickled. _I can’t breathe._

And this was the worst part: She clambered to her feet before he could slip into the hallway, and the clear air beyond. “Wait, Levi –“

Reflexively, he took a step back from her reaching hand, and that’s when he saw it; a flicker in her expression, a flash of hurt in her eyes, and her awkward silence of the afternoon slid into focus: it was his fault! She’d noticed his flinching reticence and it upset her. If he was smart, he wouldn’t care. He didn’t have the patience or inclination for this emotions crap, anyway. He’d get the hell out of this horrible room and cut a wider berth around her schedule, so they would be forced to suffer one another’s presence only on the field.

_That’s a bad idea._

“What?” he made himself say. Somehow, he could sense it; a change in the air, a certain, creeping inevitability that terrified him. He did care; he cared enough to bleed, and he couldn’t escape.

Her brows furrowed; her eyes seemed larger in this light. _(Don’t stare at her eyes)._ It took him more than a passing moment to place her expression, though at this point in their grudging partnership he was familiar with the gamut. He’d seen her mull over a problem, descending almost completely into the dynamic landscape of her thoughts, but this was different, unsure. _Doubt._

His resolve faltered.

“You – I’ve hardly –“ She trailed off, closed her eyes. “You can tell me if I’ve done something. You should. This – sneaking around, it’s not conducive to teamwork.”  Her tone was forced. “Or appropriate for officers.”

Levi could only stare. Something curled in his stomach, pulling taut. It hadn’t even occurred to him that she might feel responsible for his coldness, that any normal person would assume to be at fault. Normally, these lapses in understanding only pissed him off, but he wasn’t pissed, or frustrated, or anything that he recognized in himself. He looked at her and said nothing.

 “What happened?” she asked. And he knew it wasn’t like her other questions, her other curiosities; the need to know for its own sake, or for the greater good. This was a question that lived next to her heart.

He could only answer such a question with the truth. She deserved that much. “You were … I don’t remember. I don’t remember all of the shit you do, just that you’d been working for almost three days straight, and you hadn’t eaten anything aside from hardtack in twice that long. And you weren’t even researching or writing, you were running around headquarters with your samples, then you were doing tests with the live subjects, then you were strategizing with Erwin. You – you think your health is something you can take for granted, the way you act. Don’t bother arguing with me, you do. You act like you’ll never starve or get sick, and it’s stupid as hell.”

He took a long breath, let it out slow. “So I made you some food. I went out and picked some strawberries, because I’d seen some on the ride back. And I thought you could use something other than fucking goddamn hardtack.”

“They were good,” she said softly.

“Look, I used to, with … Isabel and Farlan  – she used to love dandelions. They were rare in the Underground, and she loved them, even when they got puffy. Especially then. And I used to pick up whatever goddamn dandelions I saw, because – I don’t really know. I just did, without thinking about it. And – “ His voice had grown hoarse. “And I still do it, even today.”

 _Don’t you understand?_ he nearly begged. _You understand everything else._

It would be the same with her. Because care was a phantom limb, and it lingered long after its subject had gone. He could spend every waking minute guarding against those memories, those lovely habits, and they’d still rise under his hands without his permission. She could die – easily, considering the way she carried on – and years later he’d still be circling libraries, anxious for some unmet reason. The smell of graphite and cedar would overwhelm him before he even realized what was happening.

That was the worst part. He’s been looking for it this time. He knew better.

“So … so I’m – I hadn’t noticed it happening. Just one day making sure you’re – it’s part of my routine. Every day. Has Hange eaten? Has she bathed?” He felt frustration well up in his chest; already, he felt foolish for his boyish confession, clumsily conveyed. “You shouldn’t take it for granted. You know that, shitty-glasses? You stick your hand in some disgusting crap and it festers, then what? Then you’ll remember me telling you to wash your goddamn hands. Or what happens if you spend a week in your office, working, and don’t eat the whole time. And no one comes to feed you. Good luck getting to the mess hall without someone carting your stupid ass there. And don’t think I don’t notice you repacking your saddlebag and leaving behind your hardtack for your goddamn calipers and other bullshit. Can you eat calipers? They going to do you any good if you get cut off?”  

She understood; she always understood him. When it came down to it. While he ranted uselessly, struggling to outrun the shame of his confession with a lecture more suited to a child, she reached for his hand and laced their fingers together, and the words died in the back of his throat. And all he could smell was her hair, and all he could see were her eyes, still too large, too bright. _Too much._

That was the worst part. They just stood there holding hands like idiots, and it felt like everything.


	2. Chapter 2

Levi woke as a man bound for execution might; disoriented and clammy with sweat. Dread settled cold and heavy over him, like a soaked blanket.  It only took him a few heartbeats to remember what day it was, and to curse himself and everyone in his proximity for it. Especially Erwin. Hange had probably been involved too – she was always sticking her nose in everything. He stared at the slatted ceiling for ten full minutes and attempted to summon the fortitude necessary to deal with an entire day of filthy teenagers stammering their congratulations, as if being born was some kind of accomplishment. 

He wasn’t even sure if staying alive was. From what he’d seen, death came from your failures, but success came down to stupid chance.

With a sigh, he pushed himself upright. Useless waste of time. In thirty-six years of life, he’d probably spent a full year of it on nonsense celebrations alone. Isabel couldn’t let an occasion pass without marking it in some way, and for her there were at least two hundred in a year. (“It’s the anniversary of the time you kicked that guy off the roof! Happy Guy Roof Kick Day!”)

Well, that had been a nice occasion, at least. He’d actually done something worth attention, and the rock cakes Farlan stole had been pretty good.

Grudgingly, Levi gathered his kit and slipped into the darkened hallway like a wraith, careful to keep his steps light and breath slow. It was an hour before dawn bell, he estimated by the shade of the sky; maybe even an hour and a half. He might be able to pull off bathing and breakfast without seeing a single person. The thought brightened his outlook considerably.

That bright mood lasted until he rounded the corner and crashed into a boulder. He drew away, sneering; the obstruction was only Mike (or a Mike-shaped boulder. Always a possibility). He stared down at Levi with an inscrutable expression carved into his stony face, and Levi stared right back. Daring that giant shithead to say it.

Silence lengthened. Wind howled through the rafters.

Finally, with a cursory sniff, Mike stepped aside and resumed his patrol of the hallway. Levi’s sigh of relief was halfway out of his mouth when the taller man spoke: “Happy birthday.”

That piece of _shit_. Levi stormed into the bath without thanking him.

So commenced his ablutions. Normally bathing was the best part of his routine, yet the long shadow of his birthday consumed even this one refuge from the nonsense of daily life. He stood under a lukewarm stream of water and viciously scrubbed his hair, hard enough to strip the flesh from his skull. Back when he still felt marginally hopeful about things, he hoped that since he shared his birthday with Solstice it would pass unnoticed – painfully, yet quietly, like a kidney stone. That was the thing about hopes, though; just having them at all got you shit on later. 

The whole thing was Erwin’s fault. Without his meddling, Levi’s birthday would go unmentioned and uncelebrated, the way nature intended. He just _had_ to make conversation with the brats. _It's two holidays, actually,_ the traitor had said with a smile. He probably found the whole thing amusing.

Maybe it would have been amusing if it happened to anyone else, or at any other time in his life, or in another place. Birthdays gave him a bad feeling here; the general practice was almost like a challenge to the supernatural forces that seemed to delight in their suffering. And his birthday was something he'd happily never acknowledge again, given the choice.

Sufficiently scoured, he dressed and slipped back into the hallway, darkness pressing against his wide eyes. Still no morning bell. If he hurried, he might still be able to make it to the mess hall without being assaulted by well-wishers and their well-wishes. The whole thing made him feel tired, and far older than he actually was.

Only a few soldiers populated the mess, nursing tea and cold leftovers from the night before; they'd probably been here for hours, hounded from their rooms by nightmares and dread. There was an expedition coming soon. Erwin purposely set them after the holiday, weather allowing; Levi couldn't decide whether this was a kindness or not.

But soon carols wafted through the open kitchen door, filling the room like sweet smoke. The Survey Corps actually had a few good singers; if he wasn't forced to hide from unnecessary birthday-related tidings, he'd stay here for a few hours, maybe, or follow the singers through the halls. There was something a little sweet about it, in a pointless kind of way.

Erwin had given them all the day off, so he could hide from the proceedings if he really wanted. Hange probably wasn't taking the day off, though; he'd find her in her newly organized office, writing. Speculating. Haranguing Moblit about minutiae. Moblit should be freed from his obligations, of course. (And Hange shouldn't be alone).

A quandary, then. He could risk the kitchens long enough to swipe something fast, but the tone of the carols was so earnest and joyful that Levi knew they'd be positively bursting with goodwill, which would then be inflicted on him, and he'd then be consigned to an awkward interaction at least three minutes long while they praised him for something even the shittiest people alive managed to accomplish. He decided to forgo breakfast altogether.

He'd no sooner made the decision when his squad materialized before him; four vastly different faces nearly identical with anticipation and delight. "Hap--"

"Merry-"

"No, you idiot, we were going to say --"

"Will you shut--"

Erd stepped in front of Auruo and Petra, shooting them a withering look before smiling at Levi. "We _meant_ to say Happy Birthday, sir."

Auruo scowled at the dig, though if Levi was being honest, he'd rather have been told _Merry Solstice_ than anything else. At their expressions, and Auruo and Petra’s whispered squabbling, some of his irritation receded. They meant well. They had no reason to expect Levi would be especially touchy about birthdays, mostly because he was a reticent shithead about everything. So he would make an attempt for his squad. He would be nice. "Thank you," he ground out.

Sometimes, he felt a lot like their uncle. Uncomfortably related.

They beamed; even Gunter, whose smiles were rare as sunlight in winter. Before he could escape, Petra held a neatly wrapped package out to him. “It’s from all of us,” she explained. 

“Nothing big,” Erd said. “Just thought you might like it.”

Levi stared. So that’s what they’d been so secretive about on their last furlough, creeping around and hissing at each other while wearing urgent expressions.

“You don’t have to open it right away either,” Petra added hastily.

 _Thank god._ He didn’t know whether to be dismayed or impressed. He _did_ know should refuse; exchanging gifts was so personal, and after all, he didn’t give a crap about their birthdays, no more than anyone else in the Survey Corps would. The concept, he told himself. The concept was bullshit.

He was still telling himself when his fingers curled around the package, brushing cheap paper and twine. “You didn’t have to do that crap.”

“We wanted to,” Auruo blurted, before coloring. _Too earnest._ He’d start overcompensating soon, and Levi intended to be well away by then.

"Don't you have some Yule shit to do or something?"

"Well, we wanted to celebrate your birthday too," Petra said. "We didn't want you to think you'd been forgotten, since you have to share with another holiday." The others nodded sagely.

They were all too nice about this crap. It made him anxious.

He was still groping for a suitable excuse to retreat when Hange materialized at his shoulder, as if he’d summoned her through need alone. “There you are,” she said, with exaggerated relief. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

“What do you want.”

“Don’t be like that! I need your help. It’s important,” she said importantly.

“Squad Leader, it’s his–“

“It’s time sensitive, I’m afraid,” she said above their protests. “Really can’t wait. This is _very_ important,” she repeated with the solemnity of a judge, before ushering him away.

“Sir –“

“Very important!” she called over her shoulder. “Merry Solstice!”

Silence, heavy with dismay, broken only at the last moment. “I told you,” Gunter muttered at their backs. And the squabbling began anew.  

~

“You do it on purpose.”

“I haven’t the faintest idea of what you’re talking about.”

“You like to throw people off balance.”

“Really? You’re going to give me trouble for that.” A pointed look over the rim of her glasses. “ _You_.”

“I don’t _like_ doing it. I just do it.”

“Then why do it?”

He glowered at her. “People forget their bullshit for a minute, when you rattle them.”

“Exactly. Allows you to control the situation.”

“So that’s what you’re doing with my squad, then?”

“I extricated you from an entire day of exhausting social interaction and this is the thanks I get? A lecture over my methods.” But she grinned at him. “You know I did it for good reasons. You just want the moral high ground.”

“Since when has that ever mattered to me.”

“Hm.” She reached above him to push open the door to her office, and gestured for him to enter with a little flourish. "It's clean today too."  

It was, indeed; in fact, Hange had gone through the trouble of decorating for the holiday. (The real holiday, not his fake one). A hastily-assembled garland draped across the back wall, sagging nearly to the floor in the middle. There was something kind of sweet about its sloppiness, which annoyed him – he knew what was responsible for this lapse.  

"What did you need me to do," he asked, straightening the stupid thing until it hung even.   

“I don’t actually need you to do anything,” she said with a shrug, a glint of something like mischief in her eyes. “I just thought you’d appreciate the quiet.”  

“Are you going to be quiet?”  

She flashed him a grin. “Relatively.”  

He expected as much.

They piled onto Hange’s battered couch, Hange with a rude flop, Levi with a spiteful attempt at grace. She had to be ostentatious about everything, he thought, attempting to summon the customary irritation such behavior would inspire if it came from anyone else, almost as a test. Nothing doing. She’d managed to make the ridiculous adorable.

“Maybe you could help me …” she began.

“You’re not working today,” he said flatly.

She mastered a grin, “I’m not?”

“You work every day, you’re always elbows deep in some disgusting bullshit, even when you don’t have to be. Just give it a rest for one day.”

“Maybe I should take advantage of the peace and quiet to really get something done. I have a list as long as you are tall …”

He ground his teeth – he knew she wouldn’t have been able to hold out for long. “Consider it a gift to me.”

“Levi!” She rounded on him, delighted. “My time is a gift to you! That’s so sweet.”

He glowered. The last person to accuse him of being sweet was long dead, and the reminder abraded. “No, I’m not.” He knew enough about himself to know that his blunt affect chafed most people; sometimes it seemed as if his comrades only respected him for his skill, not the person it bore. Not that he blamed them.

Hange saw him differently – she smiled where most recoiled, leaned forward eagerly where most would withdraw and close their eyes to the truth, draped as it was in his harsh words. She loved the truth above all else, and you could never doubt what Levi said.

A chorus of forceful knocks startled him out of his reverie. Hange leapt to her feet and crossed the room in two irritated paces. “Yes, what is it?” she said as she swung the door open, her tone forbidding. One opened her mouths to respond but Hange cut them off before they could finish: “No, no, I don’t care. Take that back to the kitchens. I’m very busy, do you understand? I have a lot to work to do.”

They were dismayed. “On the Solstice?”

“Of course on Solstice!” Hange exploded. “My inquiries don’t take holidays. Dismissed.”

"But sir--"

She shut the door in their faces. But as she turned back to flop onto her couch again, she froze in place, studying him intently, her eyes wide behind the lenses of her glasses. Finally, a grin curved her mouth. “A _ha_! A smile!”

“Shut up.”

“I saw it!”

“You didn’t see shit.”

“I was looking right at your face!” She collapsed beside him and grabbed his hand before he could wiggle away. “You _do_ care.”

It was easier between them now, somehow improved after his clumsy confession. She no longer assumed she’d done something to upset him; now she knew that behind his reticence was a heart so tender you could crush it to dust with the slightest errant touch.  

It annoyed him to be thought of as delicate, though there were days where he indeed felt brittle, a breath away from dissolving into a million motes of dust. He felt less so when Hange held his hand, her strong callused fingers pressing shapes into his palm. He hated to be touched, hated the sensation of anything on his skin, but he didn’t hate this. Another exception – it was almost as if she operated on those alone. The usual rules didn’t apply.

“I missed you this week,” Hange said, tucking her legs under herself.

“You saw me every day. Sometimes for hours.”

“Yeah, I know, I just … I feel like this is the first time I’ve really seen you. Relaxed, almost smiling. Peaceful.”

“I’m not.”

“You melted right into that couch, like you’d been waiting a thousand years for it.”

“That has nothing to do with anything.”

“You have your own room, you know. You could melt there, away from me.”

“How do you know that I don’t?”

Her smile acquired a knowing edge, his absolute least favorite expression. “That would be telling, wouldn’t it?”

He stifled the petulant sigh burgeoning in his chest. “Very cute.”

“I’m serious, Levi.”

“No, you aren’t.”

“Well, _now_ I am. Are you sleeping at all?”

“Yes.”

“How long?”

He was starting to get annoyed with the interrogation. “Three hours, I dunno. Some shit like that. Remind me why this matters.”

“How much sleep you get determines how effective your brain is, your memory, your reflexes. Just think about how powerful you’d be if you got more than a small handful of hours.”

Probably even more so, which she knew. “You’ve figured it all out, I guess.”

“Well, I haven’t figured out what’s been bothering you. See, that’s always the hardest question to crack open. You’re so still on the surface, you’re brusque no matter what the situation is or who you’re speaking to. But lately you don’t look detached, you look lost. And I figure now’s the best time to find out why.”

“So you can know the answer?” Hoarding answers to her questions was another of her quirks – sometimes, in his darker moments, he wondered how much she actually cared about the answer for its own sake.

“Well, sure. And then I help fix it.”

Tenderness threatened to overwhelm him; just the simple assurance that she cared about him, that she thought about him when they were apart, that she worried about the things that preoccupied him wedged a lump in his throat. “I don’t like birthdays,” Levi admitted with a sigh, leaning back against the couch.

“Not even when you were a kid?”

“Well …” That wasn’t right. Kuchel had done everything in her power to spoil him, though their means were pathetically few. It involved a lot of homemade toys and shadow puppet shows (The Thief and the Soldier had been his favorite), sugared walnuts from a street vendor, a cake she’d scrimped and saved for over a year, going without. It was part of a birthday to feel loved by your family, but it just reminded him that she was gone, she was dead, and he’d been too small and weak to save her. “Yeah, when I was a kid. I guess.”

He didn’t need to elaborate; Hange understood instantly. She threw her arm around his shoulder and hugged him close. “Sorry,” she said against the side of his head. “I’ll leave you alone in a minute. It’s just not right that you have a birthday without getting a good long hug. That’s how we do birthdays in my house, you know. We do this kind of thing right.”

“How long is ‘long’, exactly?”

“Ah, Levi, c’mon. Don’t worry. Just a minute, or two … or ten.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Oh, calm down.” She loosened her grip on him, but somehow this was worse, tender in a way he couldn’t defend against. He felt the warmth of her shuddery breath on his neck as she burrowed closer, pressing him tight against herself. He skimmed a hand up her back, tracing each notch and nob of her spine, until she shivered against him. His hands moved of their own accord, winding themselves in her ridiculous hair, so soft and smooth, so clean. The realization that she made an effort when her natural state was to forget to care for herself struck him like a physical blow. She wasn’t immune to him or his idiosyncrasies, she tried to accommodate them for his sake.

A great sigh escaped him. In her arms, he felt like he could rest for the first time in decades. Half-lulled, he almost didn’t feel the softness of her lips against his temple. He flinched, and she drew back when he did, her eyes wide with horror. “I’m sorry Levi, I wasn’t thinking –”

“Shut up, Four Eyes.” He couldn’t stand for her to be ashamed of something so wonderful that his blood was still singing and his heart racing, his entire body vibrating like a plucked string, and all over the most chaste contact one could even imagine.

But … it hadn’t been chaste, not really. Her lips lingered too long, they were too warm, they trembled. It meant the same thing to them both. Before she could get the wrong idea, he craned close and gently pressed his mouth to hers.

Her lips parted in surprise, and a wild sound caught in the back of his throat. They drew back in mutual shock, eyes wide. It was barely a kiss, but it felt like everything. But most surprising of all was that the gesture had startled Hange into silence; she looked at him with wide eyes, her cheeks stained crimson. He realized he’d never really seen her blush before.

“You meant to do that?” she whispered.

In response, he kissed her again. He learned her the way a child learns to read, the way one uncovers a basic skill they’d never had the chance to entertain, for their world was hard. He kissed her, and neither of them spoke for a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this fic is still a thing! part 3 will be posted sometime before the inevitable heat death of the universe. thanks for reading and leaving feedback!


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